


Moving on

by Sarahell



Category: Grey's Anatomy
Genre: Abuse, Adoption, Comfort, F/M, Foster Care, Grey's Anatomy - Freeform, Help, Hurt, after-alex
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-01
Updated: 2020-07-02
Packaged: 2021-03-04 23:07:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,094
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25014439
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sarahell/pseuds/Sarahell
Summary: When Jo Wilson discovers an abused foster child in the ER, she makes it her mission to save 10 year old Max Hart from another 8 years of misery in foster care.With the support of Meredith, Link and Teddy, can Jo rise above her own problems to create a new home for Max and give him the childhood that she never had?
Relationships: Atticus Lincoln & Jo Wilson Karev, Meredith Grey & Jo Wilson Karev
Comments: 5
Kudos: 15





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I really want a happy ending for Jo. She deserves it and after the baby stealing episode I thought it would be fun to write a story where she takes on a kid of her own. 
> 
> We've never see who Jo is without Alex, so I think this is a really interesting concept.

After Alex left, and Glasses moved out, Jo decided that she didn’t want to be alone. At first she’d been hesitant about asking Meredith if she could move back in, Jo knew the older woman would say yes in a heartbeat, but Jo felt like a burden to her. It wasn’t until Meredith caught her sleeping in the on-call room for the fourth night in a row (preferring to be lonely in a hospital full of people rather than being truly alone at the loft) that Jo felt like she had no choice but to ask the older woman. 

Jo sat up on the hard bed and ran a hand through her dishevelled hair, if she was being honest with herself, Jo was anxious because she didn’t know whether Meredith still wanted to talk to her, to be in her life. It had been different when she’d been with Alex because Alex was Meredith’s person and Jo was sure that Meredith felt some sort of obligation to protect Jo in order to keep Alex happy. Or maybe Jo was just overthinking and couldn’t get her head around the idea that yet another person wanted to be in her life without wanting anything from her in return. 

“Why didn’t you ask sooner?” Meredith sat down besides Jo as the younger surgeon quietly reiterated the question of moving in with Meredith who gave her a pointed look. “Is this why you’ve been sleeping here every night this week, because you’ve been afraid to ask me if you could move back in?” 

Jo sighed. “Alex is gone, you don’t have to look out for me anymore if you don’t want to” The obscene look of confusion across Meredith’s face was enough to make Jo feel guilty and she quickly backtracked her words. “I didn’t mean to imply that all the stuff you did for me was just because you wanted Alex to stay, I just…” she trailed off and Meredith’s face softened. 

“It’s okay. This is new territory for us, we don’t know what our friendship looks like without Alex. Not to say we’ve never been close friends, just that things are a bit different now” Meredith chuckled. “Of course you can move back in Jo, the kids love you and I could use the extra hand around the house right now” 

“Thank you” Jo sighed in relief just as the sound of her being paged echoed throughout the room. Meredith nodded towards the door. “Looks like you’ve got to go” she said “Come round with your stuff tonight if you want” 

The world suddenly seemed a whole lot lighter and Jo cracked a huge grin. “Okay. I’ll see you later!” The young surgeon exclaimed, rushing from the room and towards the ER to where she’d been paged.  
———————————————————————————————————————----------------------------------------------------------------------------  
“What’s going on?” Jo approached Owen, pulling on a pair of protective gloves and following a team of doctors outside. 

Owen looked stressed. “We’re about to be over-run. There been an apartment block fire only a few streets away from here and there’s been a lot of injuries so we need all hands on deck” He broke out into a light jog and pulled away from Jo as the first ambulance appeared from around the corner.  
Suddenly all hell broke loose. 

For what felt like hours, Jo worked tirelessly to help cure as many patients as possible, she’d never been an expert at dealing with burns of any kind so she took the less severely injured of the fire victims and instead let Avery deal with the harsher burns. She had just finished dressing an old man’s arm when Jo noticed a scene from the corner of her eye, something she wished she’d never have to see again.  
In the corner of the waiting room, a middle age couple stood against the wall, the man in the relationship was tall and seemed to have a permanent snarl that flickered across his lips. His head was stretched thin with hair and the wrinkles beneath his eyes suggested that he didn’t get much sleep. Next to him stood a woman, not quite as tall as the man but intimidating nonetheless. Her short brown hair was twisted up into a tight bun on her forehead, her eyes were black as coal. Jo would recognise the couple from anywhere. 

Mr and Mrs Collins. 

Jo almost threw up on the spot. She had to physically pinch her own skin to stop herself from filling the room with the stench of sick…unfortunately when Jo cast her eyes over the young boy with a cut to his forehead, standing between Mr and Mrs Collins, Jo couldn’t control her stomach any longer. She dodged her way though several gurneys in the ER, past a very confused Owen and Teddy and into the bathroom. She fell straight into a stall as the contents of her lunch escaped her throat. 

A few seconds later, Jo heard the bathroom door open behind her and she clutched the toilet seat tighter as Teddy’s voice rung out around the room. “Hey Wilson…Jo are you all right?” She felt Teddy kneel beside her, holding back her hair. 

“I-I’m fine” 

“No you’re not” Was the quick reply. 

Jo fell back from the toilet and leant against the stall door, Teddy still by her side. Jo hadn’t known Teddy for long but the woman had proven to be a good person, despite her drama with Amelia and Owen. She’d called her out back when she was in a state of depression and although Jo hadn’t appreciated it at the time, she was grateful that Teddy had tried. But Jo wasn’t ready to tell anyone about who’d she just seen. Not before she had a plan.

“I’m just, over tired” She excused. “I haven’t eaten since lunch and some of those burns are pretty bad” 

Teddy looked the young girl over suspiciously. She knew she was lying but didn’t want to push further, instead she let Jo stand up and wash her hands. “Promise me you’ll eat something” she said. 

“Promise” Jo gave her a small smile. “We should probably get back out there.” Teddy reluctantly nodded but abruptly pulled Jo back by the wrist as she made her way to the door. 

“Just…this isn’t a repeat of before, is it Wilson? Because if you’re falling back into a state of depression just know that it’s okay and that you can get help agai…”

“I promise this isn’t like last time” Jo interrupted the older woman. “But thanks for asking” 

Jo headed back out into the ER without another word and glanced once over the room, looking for Mr and Mrs Collins and the young boy who they’d previously been with. Within seconds she found them, being guided to a spare bed by Helm who was prepping to stitch the young boy’s head up.

With an anxious breath, Jo approached the family, silently hoping that they wouldn’t recognise her. Because why would they? It had happened 15 years ago, Jo was an adult now, a surgeon, so far from the foster kid teenager that she’d once been. Mr and Mrs Collins would barely even give her a second glance. 

“Hi, Helm I’ve got this one” Jo spoke up as she neared the bed where the injured boy sat. Mr and Mrs Collins looked up at her unexpectedly but didn’t object as Jo took the needle and thread from Helm who stepped aside and watched Jo curiously as she studied the young boy.  
“I’m Doctor Jo Wilson. What’s your name little guy?” 

“Max” the boy muttered, his eyes filling with tears as he clutched his bloody hair. Jo smiled. 

“Cool name. So how’d this happen?” She glanced expectantly up at Mr and Mrs Collins who exchanged a quick glance between then before answering in perfect sync. 

“He tripped into the wall” their answer was robotic and one that Jo recognised all too well. She rose her eyebrows but said nothing more on the topic. 

“Helm will you collect Max’s personal information from his parents please?” She gestured up at Mr and Mrs Collins who squirmed uncomfortably, they looked reluctantly but followed Helm away from Max and over to reception. Jo began to explain to Max what she was going to do to fix his head, she numbed the area then began with the stitches, after a while Max spoke. 

“They aren’t my real parents” the young boy mumbled. 

“No?” Jo replied, already knowing the answer to her next question. “Why are you with them then?”

"I'm in foster care. They're my foster parents"


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jo has a plan. Link worries.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi! Link appears in this chapter, I love his relationship with Jo and think it's so cute.

“Foster care, huh?” The boy flinched as Jo inserted the last of the stitches. “I know a thing or two about that.”

“How? Did your parents throw you away too?” Max’s curious eyes roamed Jo’s face, she gave him a sad smile and shrugged. 

“Something like that” she replied, unable to delve into the pain of her past while faced with a problem in her present. The subject was quickly changed. “So that must’ve been a harsh trip, falling into the wall and hurting your head as badly as you did” 

Max struggled to find an answer. Jo studied his chart, he was 10 and already had a long list of injuries under his belt. A broken arm, ankle fracture, a broken rib…and now this. Jo had collected a similar list of injuries while in care and none of them had been the result of a happy childhood where learning to ride a bike had caused an accidental broken arm or a water fight that had given her grazed knees. 

Jo had scars across her body from foster parents who got off on abuse. And she hated that nothing about living in foster care had changed since she’d been a kid, young children were still getting hurt at the hands of nasty adults. Jo knew Max’s injury had been a result of Mr and Mrs Collins because she remembered all too well what they’d done to her. It hurt almost too much to relive. 

When Max still hadn’t answered her previous question, Jo knelt down so that she was eye level with the kid, he gently looked at her and something about it made Jo’s insides melt. She wanted…no…she needed to help this boy. 

“Max, are you sure that’s all that happened? You tripped and that was it? Nothing else you want to tell me?” Jo could see the conflict and hurt behind the boy’s eyes, he hesitated, biting his lip until he glanced at someone over Jo’s shoulder and violently shook his head. Jo turned to follow his gaze and felt her stomach sink when she saw Mr and Mrs Collins walking back over to them, Helm following close behind. 

“Are you finished doctor?” Mr Collins’ eyes burnt into Jo’s, so much so that she quickly broke eye contact and stood up. She nodded as Max hopped down from the bed and Mrs Collins slowly wrapped an arm around his shoulder, the family gave Jo a quick nod before striding from the ER. 

Max hadn’t admitted anything. Social services wouldn’t be any help yet and Jo felt utterly useless. She threw the needle into the bedpan and ran a hand over her face, Jo knew that if she just spoke up about what happened to her in that household as a teenager, then Max would be ushered out of that house without a second thought, the only problem was that his next house could be ten times worse.

Jo wanted to scream. 

“Umm Doctor Wilson, are you okay?” Helm asked from behind. “I’ve got Max’s contact information, do you want to look over it? It’s in the system.” 

“Did you get their address?” Jo spun around suddenly, an idea forming in her head. She snatched the tablet from Helm and studied Max’s page. His full name was Max Hart and he’d been living with the Collins for almost a year now, she let out a breath of relief as she spotted their address on the bottom of the page. She knew where that was, it was only a 20 minute drive. 

Going against patient protocols, Jo snapped a picture of the address and handed the tablet back to Helm who opened her mouth to say something but Jo sprinted away before she got the chance to. She made a beeline for the elevator and pulled out her phone once inside.

“Link?” Jo said after ringing her best friend’s number. “Where are you right now?” 

“Just got out of surgery and heading to the canteen, why?” He questioned through the phone. 

“I’ll meet you there” 

Jo had a plan to get Max out of foster care. She knew it was stupid and reckless. An hour ago she hadn’t even known the small boy, but now? Now all she wanted to do was save him from a further childhood of misery, she wanted him to have the childhood that she’d never had. 

It was a little after 10pm once Jo stepped foot in the canteen. She glanced around the room as doctors slumped tiredly in chairs after a day of hard work and a night of more work ahead of them. Jo pulled her scrubs tighter to her body as she realised the temperature had suddenly dropped. 

“Jo!” Link waved from a table to her right. The Ortho surgeon was busy devouring a plate of potato when Jo dropped down into the seat next to him, eyes ablaze with determination. 

“I need your help” 

“What’s up?”

“Before I ask this of you, I just wanted to get it clear that this isn’t technically kidnapping” Jo blurted out. Link choked. 

“Please don’t tell me you stole another baby” 

Jo took a breath. “Technically, he’s a 10 year old boy…and I haven’t….” She searched for the right word “rescued him yet” Link pushed his plate away and firmly shook his head. 

“Jo you’re my best friend. But I will not help you kidnap a child!” He grabbed her hands. “Whatever this is, promise me you won’t go through with this horrible idea” 

Frustrated, Jo tugged her hands away from Link who was staring at her with concern. Ever since Alex had left, ever since her depressive episode, Jo felt as though she was in a petting cage surrounded by glass for everyone to stare at. She knew people were worried about her but Jo had been through worse and she always found a way to get through the other side. Yes Alex was gone. But that didn’t mean her life was over. She needed to move on and figure out what she wanted. 

And right now, she wanted to save Max Hart. 

“Mr and Mrs Collins. I told you about them once, right?” 

Link frowned. “Yeah. Yeah they were the assholes who left you without food for a week, weren’t they?” 

Jo nodded frantically. “They were also the couple who would put their cigarette butts out on my skin or kick the back of my knees so that I fell face first to the floor whenever they felt like it” She took a shaky breath. “I saw them, Link. I saw them in the ER with another foster kid, Max was his name. He had a deep cut to his head, he needed stitches” 

Background noise seemed to fade away as Jo watched Link’s face pale. He ran a hand over his face then glanced back up at Jo, muscles tense. “Was it them? Mr and Mrs Collins? Did Max say that they hurt him?”

“Not exactly but I have a feeling…” 

“Jo!” Link interrupted. “You can’t kidnap a child based on a feeling! You need proof and proper authorities! You can’t do this yourself, you’d be breaking the law! You’d lose your job and you know it.” 

“I am the proof Link! They…i know it was them because they hurt me too! And social workers don’t do anyone any good. Max will be dropped off at another crappy home where he suffers even worse.”

“Jo…”

“He’s 10 years old, Link. He’s 10 years old and alone and afraid. I know it” 

Link sighed. “So, say you somehow manage to get the kid out, what happens to him then? You can’t possibly think he can stay with you…do you?” 

“Why not? I can take care of him, get him the help he needs. I can protect him!”

“And you don’t think anyone else will find it suspicious that you just happened to take in a ten year old kid? Social services will still look for him Jo!” The two surgeons sat in silence for a moment, Jo knew she sounded insane but she also remembered how it felt to be Max’s age, alone in the system with no one to rely on. All she had wanted was for some sort of guardian angel to take her away and keep her safe for the rest of her life. Someone to hug her nightmares away and tuck her into bed at night.  
She desperately wanted that for Max. 

“Jo if this is about Alex leaving and trying to find something to replace him then…”

“It’s not!” Jo slammed her hands down in frustration. 

“Then do it the proper way. If you really want this kid. If you really want to help him then do it the proper way. File a complaint, report what happened to you as a child, follow the procedure from there and who knows, you could end up with Max in your care eventually” Link assured her. 

“Eventually isn’t soon enough!” 

Link bit his lip as his phone buzzed, shattering the angry tension between the pair. “I have to go” he said, rising from his seat. “Jo you’re my best friend and so what I’m about to say is with all the love in the world…I will not sit back and watch you fall down another rabbit hole, this time I’ll get you the kind of help you need before you do something that can’t be reversed.” 

“What are you saying?” 

“I don’t want to see you torture yourself again, Jo. If you need to get back to therapy it’s okay. Just ask for help and I’ll be the first by your side. But I’m not going to help you steal a kid. Not when I have one of my own that I need to look after from outside a prison cell” 

Jo couldn’t breathe as she watched Link leave. Breathing had been a struggle lately.


End file.
